


This Whole Thing Got a Little Out of Hand

by Books_and_Cats_and_Coffee (orphan_account)



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: AU, Humor, M/M, The Proposal inspired, ish
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-20
Updated: 2019-09-20
Packaged: 2020-10-24 10:10:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,652
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20704247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/Books_and_Cats_and_Coffee
Summary: Slade Wilson hated his boss. Well, maybe 'hate' is a strong word. Slade Wilson despised his boss, a fact perfectly balanced out by the universe because Oliver Queen didn't like him so much either. And he still doesn't like him when a problem with over controlling family members forces him to seek out Slade's help.It was really just a video call. Five minutes at most, but somehow, it all spiraled into something much, much worse. Thanksgiving is a time for family gathering, isn't it?





	This Whole Thing Got a Little Out of Hand

Slade Wilson made a habit of never asking for favors. He never allowed himself to be indebted to anyone, no matter how close a friend they seemed to be. Life was simply easier that way, less complicated, less dangerous. The fierce independence had been burned into him during childhood, and Slade had never let it go. It kept everything simple…until the day when it all went to shit, and that was what led to this predicament, sitting in a small café, tucked away in the booth in the furthest corner. The bell over the door jingling as costumers came in, barely any of them looking up from their phones long enough to notice their surroundings.

Really, Slade reflected, he should have just shot Queen, made sure dental records were impossible to retrieve, and burn the body in the woods. Of course, Oliver Queen _was_ the manager of the most popular, successful nightclub in the entire city, the same place Slade worked as security, so maybe that wasn’t the smartest move.

Then again, there were freak accidents, especially at clubs. And sure, maybe it’d be obvious that the syringe had been forcefully stabbed into the guy’s arm, but who’d look that closely? Slade didn’t want to say he _hated_ his boss. He’d just…probably not make any attempt to help if Oliver were to be lit on fire and Slade was holding an extinguisher. In fact, he might just throw it out the window. Why he disliked the man so much was a little hard to explain without sounding batshit crazy. Sometimes, Slade missed the military, because it didn’t have this line of pretentious, self-absorbed rich kids that made up that whole generation. And that was exactly who Oliver Queen was. Slade had seen it night after goddamn night. Sometimes early in the evening as well, if he came in too early or stood in the wrong place.

They really didn’t know each other well, Oliver had barely glanced at his resume before giving him the job and running off to go yell instructions to some of the movers. So maybe it wasn’t entirely Queen’s fault; Slade hated having to take a security job, he hated clubs, and somehow Oliver seemed seem to be the center of it. To be fair, Oliver didn’t like him much either, and probably only let Slade stay aboard after that run in with the really drunk, pugnacious wrestler who Slade had single-handedly dragged out before a fight could even start. Apparently, he terrified most of the staff.

And that was another thing, most people didn’t like him, but most people were also nervous around him. Oliver wasn’t. Maybe he wasn’t fond of Slade, but he never showed any fear or nervousness, in fact, the emotion he typically portrayed was annoyance. It was certainly obvious that the rest of the staff left the room as soon as both got within six feet of each other. They never held a real conversation, the most Slade knew about Oliver was what he had seen; primarily, it seemed he was unable to keep a relationship (not that Slade could really judge him on that particular topic). On top of that, all of Oliver’s ex’s shared this same, overly dependent and typically lazy sort of personality. Why he drifted to the same disastrous type time and time, Slade had no idea. But he did, like clockwork.

All of that, Slade could live with, the snide comments he and Oliver snipped at each other throughout the night, the ways they put more work into just annoying each other -like when Oliver had figured out Slade glitter and sparkles of any kind, and personally bedazzled the wall directly behind where Slade was stationed- any of it. But there was one thing for which Slade would never forgive Oliver, and he thought of it now only as ‘the incident.’

Slade had been accused of being insane or crazy or batshit more times than he could count. Usually, it was shouted by some drunk arse kid after he kicked them out. However, no matter what people claimed, he had nothing on his ex-wife. The woman was a verified psychopath (or at least he’d like to think so) and had that kind of mental streak in her that went way past what some guys considered ‘cute’. So, when Adeline Kane had marched into Verdant one night, dressed to kill and probably armed for it as well, Slade thought it was all over. Their breakup had been less than ideal, Slade was gone, Adeline felt abandoned, Slade came back, Adeline tried to kill him, nothing out of the ordinary. It had been messy, uncomfortable, and utterly one sided, he was sure the woman had an in with the court. When he moved out of Australia, the country that he still loved, he thought that maybe, just maybe, it’d be enough. Apparently, it wasn’t, and Adeline, in all her rising insanity, had tracked him to the states. And then shown up at his work.

She’d seen him, it’d only been a matter of minutes, and Slade immediately saw the flames going off behind her eyes. She was drunk, probably high as well, and pissed, and set off towards him with a fury. She got there, and had just started yelling, the noise barely drowned out by music, when Slade -who had been wondering if maybe knocking her out would be the best option- received an unexpected and utterly unwelcome savior.

Oliver had simply seemed to materialize out of the crowd, side tracking Adeline as he asked her polite question, paid her over exaggerated compliments, and diffused the situation so easily and charmingly that he had Adeline whisked away and out of the club before Slade could even think to help. To make matters worse, Slade hadn’t seen her again, and he was suspicious that Oliver might have even gone so far as to pay the woman or set her up some other way.

God knows it would be easy.

Oliver never mentioned the exchange ever again. It didn’t make it any better. Especially when he showed up early one morning at closing, catching Slade and asking, with obvious uncertainty, to speak to him in private. Slade hadn’t been very excited about the idea.

“This is your club,” he said shortly. “You’re saying it’s not private enough?” Oliver was playing with the fingers of his left hand down by his side, pinching at the air with his thumb and index finger. It was a nervous habit Slade had noticed before.

“I need to ask you for a favor,” Oliver admitted. “And um,” he rubbed the edge of his nose. “This probably isn’t the best place to discuss it.” A favor. It was both bad and potentially a good thing. A favor meant something that would prevent Oliver from holding the _incident _over his head. Of course, the favor could also be much worse, the exact reason why Slade refused to let himself be indebted to anyone. But for some reason, he had agreed, and that was what let to him being here…staring across the table at Oliver, trying to figure out if he was more confused or amused.

“Explain it again,” he said, and Oliver’s face, tense with stress and worry, slipped into a glare.

“I’ve already gone over it five times,” he snapped, fingers curling around his cup of coffee. He took it plain, apparently. Slade smirked.

“And I still can’t understand how you managed this level of fuck up,” he said. Oliver groaned allowed, not even bothering to defend himself as he sunk his head onto the table. He sat up a moment later, determined.

“Just one video call, five minutes at most,” Oliver plead. “After which I will never bring up the whirling hurricane that was your ex-wife wanting to drag you to court.” Slade’s smirk turned into a frown that he buried in his coffee. That was what she had been on about. There really were no loose ends, he had let her take almost everything, leaving the marriage with less than half of what he had gone in with. But knowing Adeline, she’d dig up something. The bell tinkled softly, and Slade instinctively glanced up at the woman who entered. She tucked her fingers into her pockets, walking up to the counter to place her order with the exhausted barista. They both offered each other tired smiles, that kind of worn out look that said, _hey, I know you’re not doing well either, but I guess neither of us are going to address it so, yeah. _The café was small, Slade and Oliver the only two sitting at a table. It was clean, or at least, passable, but more importantly, the coffee wasn’t shit, and it was cheap.

“So your parents hassle you about having a ‘successful life’ part of which, a major part apparently, they assume to be a stable relationship, which, of course, you’ve never been able to keep.” Slade repeated. Oliver frowned at him.

“The ‘of course’ doesn’t belong in that sentence.” Oliver objected, his dignity rightly injured. Slade wasn’t about to let that slide.

“You’ve been in four relationships, just that I know of, in the past three months,” the Australian reminded him, Oliver muttered something incoherent before regathering himself.

“My relationship issues aren’t the topic of this conversation,” Oliver reminded him. Slade shrugged. He was enjoying himself. He had few things he could riddle his boss about, to this was certainly an upside to his day.

“It kind of it. But moving away from it for now,” Slade said, stressing the last two words. “Why don’t you talk to that internet, system, whatever girl. The two of you seem to get along well, she’s sweet, classy. Even the most obsessive mother couldn’t complain.” Oliver lowered his chin, a faint blush coloring his cheeks. Not that the color hadn’t been gradually building throughout their whole conversation. One of the reasons Slade found the situation so entertaining.

“You’re seriously underestimating just how dramatic sixteen year old me made my coming out,” he admitted, and obviously that was a story Oliver didn’t want to revisit. Of course, Slade already knew his orientation. Every date Slade had ever seen the younger man with had been a man, even if they were a weak excuse for a person in general. It didn’t bother him. There’d been brief hook-ups in the army, nothing serious, just bored soldiers. And Slade never gave a shit about who someone wanted to fuck long term. Or marry or whatever. His silence hadn’t gone on for long, but Oliver, oversensitive to the pause, went to quickly add on. “There was um something to do with fireworks and…uh there might have been a horse.” Slade raised his eyebrows. “Okay, a few horses.” Oliver relented. “But that’s not the point. My family already knows Digg, John Diggle,” he added, seeing the confusion on Slade’s face. The Australian nodded. He’d met the man.

“So this was a process of elimination, then,” Slade translated. Oliver shrugged, they weren’t near close enough to worry about hurting each other’s feelings.

“Kind of, I mean, I needed to find someone who was discreet and not an ex-”

“And the additional ex-wife incident blackmail was just an added bonus,” Slade interrupted.

“I’m not saying I’m going to go off talking about it if you say no,” Oliver said quickly. “You were just the most convenient choice, you kinda hate me, I really don’t like you, but you’re either not technology intelligent enough to try ruining my life or just not interested in trying it.”

“Yeah right I prefer the nice, old fashioned knifing someone approach.”

“Which is exactly why I wrote down _It was Slade Wilson_ on several papers just in case you kill me or someone else does,” Oliver retaliated.

“That’s the dumbest shit I’ve ever heard, you watch too many movies. You really think the cops are going to believe you had time to stumble around your home while bleeding and write that everywhere?” Slade replied.

“Maybe, but it’ll still make you a suspect,” Oliver offered. Slade finished his coffee.

“Alright, I do it.” He said decisively.

“And no one said they’d find-wait, what?” Oliver actually interrupted himself, staring at Slade in wide-eyed shock.

“I’ll do it,” Slade repeated, leaving Oliver stunned. “But after, the ex-wife incident is gone. No talking about it, or her, texting writing, anything.” The younger man nodded a couple times, seeming more surprised that Slade accepted than anything else. “Also, take down the glitter wall.”

“I’m not taking down the glitter wall.” Oliver stated stubbornly. “Or painting over. I can move you to a different station.”

“And I can send the names of all the exes you’ve collected in the past year to your mother,” Slade returned. As expected, Oliver relented.

“Fine, I’ll have them paint over it.” He muttered. Slade’s smirk was just a tad sardonic.

“What time?” he asked, glancing at his watch. It was five o’clock now, he was tired, and really just wanted to catch a few hours of sleep.

“Eight,” it was Oliver’s turn to beam at him sadistically. Slade barely refrained from rolling his eyes. Of course. Then again, it didn’t seem like Oliver could have had much more sleep. Though he did never seem to get much rest anyway.

“What reasonable people call at eight in the fucking morning?” He asked, the answer he got wasn’t the one he was one he wanted. Oliver pointed a finger at him, the serious expression he wore just barely covering his laughter.

“Ooh you’re really going to have to watch your language though,” he said. He looked a lot less uncomfortable, probably because he was able to attack Slade again. The Australian frowned at him, standing.

“Watch yourself, Queen, I can still make this into one fucking hell storm.” He threatened. Oliver didn’t seem very threatened.

“Believe it or not I think your ex-wife is still worse than my mother,” he replied. Slade decided to spare his dignity and didn’t reply, leaving Oliver to pay for the coffees and walking out. “I’ll meet you at the club,” Oliver called after him. Slade barely looked back, just enough to let the younger man know he had heard.

The bell at the top of the door dinged as he stepped out into the still darkness of the early morning, the chill setting in immediately. November always brought the cold air, it wasn’t so bad yet, and Slade trudged down the street alone, started back to his apartment. He passed a few early risers, most of them on their way to work with a dull, grey expression. They barely paid him any heed, and Slade returned the favor.

It was almost a fifteen minute walk to his apartment. When he got there, he could already hear the screaming that meant his neighbors were awake. He sighed, shaking his head on his way up the stairs. He got to the top level and unlocked the door, stepping into the cheap, small apartment. It was plain, he wasn’t one for decorating, and he’d ripped out the carpet himself after finding the first few ticks in it.

The whole building probably broke a couple safety laws, it wasn’t even listed as an address. He dropped the keys on the table along with his coat and dropped onto the couch. He didn’t have enough time to get washed, go to bed and sleep properly. Besides he was too tired. His eyes drifted close, the arguing neighbors fading into a background noise. He remembered to set an alarm before he fell asleep and set his phone on the floor.

His last thought, before he drifted off was that at least after today, Oliver wouldn’t be able to blackmail him. His dreams were confusing and random, visiting frequently by horses trotting by on fireworks.

**Author's Note:**

> This plot bunny has risen from the dead because some of y'all are way too supportive. *ahem* WHY?? But let's be real, I need minimum encouragement to write fluff. Now let me just say, rom coms are not my thing, but something about having an OTP that in canon is trying to kill each other makes you think, "hey, cupcakes and chickflick plots."


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